Current events are often immortalized in the public eye by numerous methods. On TV, events and individuals are parodied or ridiculed by comedy shows, such as SNL and late night talk shows, and by "news" shows in the vein of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. In newspapers you often see people and events lambasted via the political cartoon medium and the op-ed section. The internet is a great place to find commentary on what's happening today. You have a myriad of choices available from sites like The Onion and Jib Jab to see commentary and have a little fun. And that's not all.

Downloadable content is an interesting proposition for games these days. Having additional game content available for download after a game has been released is a proven way for publishers and developers to add more revenue and value to their products. It is not uncommon these days to get new character skins, expanded or new single player levels, multiplayer maps or new weapons and vehicles for games that you have already played. This is usually good for the game publishers and developers, but it's not always good for you.

It seems like Microsoft is the constant target for lawsuits. This week has seen word of two suits possibly being brought against the giant from Redmond. Microsoft has a ton of money and have made decisions in the past that have made them a huge target, but I don't know if this sue happy culture of ours really understands just how hard a target they are. In my opinion, one of these case has a bit of merit and one is questionable.

First up is the possible class action suit being brought against Microsoft in reaction to the mass banning of modified consoles from Xbox Live that took place last week. A law firm called AbingtonIP thinks that this episode of banning was an effort by Microsoft to increase subscriptions to it's Xbox Live service and to increase sales for a couple of high profile releases. Somehow that logic just doesn't make sense to me, but hey, I'm not a judge or a lawyer.

Next up is a suit by Datel, a manufacturer of accessories for Microsoft's Xbox 360. Datel reports that the recent firmware update has blocked usage of the products that the company makes for use on the 360. Microsoft claims that the block on Datel's 3rd party products was not intentional, but does not seem to be all that broken up about it. In a statement Microsoft says that unauthorized products are not tested for compatibility, and therefore, not guaranteed to work. Datel may have a chance with this one, especially considering Microsoft's previous bouts regarding competition, but it's unlikely we'll see any result from either of these soon-if at all.

A few days ago Sony gave a presentation explaining a host of changes that they are implementing to their overall business plan. While not a lot of depth was given in explaining their overall transformation strategy, a few details regarding specific changes for Sony's gaming division did emerge. And out of all the details there was one of more interest to me than the rest. Under the "5 Advantages Of Playstation 3" section was a slide for the Playstation Network, the last sentence on that slide read: "New revenue stream from subscription".

While having to pay for PSN may not be perceived as a good thing, I see news of subscriptions coming to PSN in a positive light. My reasoning? If we pay a bit for the service we should get something a little more out of it. Now, don't start to panic. The plan is for a two tiered system which means that the basic PSN service that we have now will stay roughly the same as it is, at least that is what is being reported at present. Although I have no idea what Sony has in mind I'm very interested to see what they have planned. A lot of us currently pay $50 for Xbox Live service and are happy forking over the dough for that. Now, it's up to Sony to make a premium PSN service that would be attractive to pay for and as feature rich as Live is.

That, most assuredly, is the question. As you all know (all 3 of you that have read my blog, wife included), I own a PS3, a 360,a PSP and a DS. What you may not know is that I really do want to pick up a Wii. Why wait? Yes, I know that Wiis have been seen in the wild everywhere and there are a ton of new games announced all the time, shouldn't this be the right time? Maybe, maybe not. In my opinion, I honestly don't think that Nintendo had gamers like me in mind when they designed their latest offering and I've been waiting for something for me, the hardcore gamer. History shows that the Wii has never really been marketed to my demographic, and that's worked for Nintendo up to this point. I do think that Nintendo needs to embrace the core gaming community, which I don't consider the casual gamer to be. But to be fair I do think that Nintendo has been changing its focus lately. Well, they haven't done a 180 away from the casual market, but they are making progress.

Since the introduction of No More Heroes I've been seeing a shift by Nintendo of including more than just the standard kid friendly fare to the Wii line-up. I think it's good that the Wii has been including games that you typically wouldn't think to see on the Nintendo console. February saw the release of a couple of games geared toward more mature and hardcore gamers. Both The House Of The Dead: Overkill and Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop came out last month for the Nintendo Wii and show that mature games do have a place on this console. In the coming months there are several other popular games and series coming to the Wii. Starting with the very unique and interesting MadWorld later this month ,continuing to The Conduit in May and Dead Space: Extraction later this year. It doesn't sound like much in the line-up right now, but there are plenty of rumored or unannounced games coming out in addition to these.

Another announcement that has me excited about the Wii involved the re-releasing of Gamecube games to Nintendo's next gen system. That's cool, right? Yes and no. It's cool that the possibility exists that some of the better last gen games are coming to the Wii with possible graphical updates and motion controls added. Who wouldn't want to see the older Zelda games revamped for this generation? Or maybe have the Metroid Prime series ported over so you can play them all on the Wii? How about seeing (one of my personal favorites) the Rouge Squadron series updated and available today? The bad news is that only a couple of games have been announced for re-release so far and there has not been any news of new titles being added for quite a while, but I'm not concerned. Nintendo has always been slow to adopt changes, so I am going to be patient and hope for the best. At least for now.

OK, so I haven't written here for a very long time, what gives, right? I just so happen to have a very good reason for disappointing all my loyal (don't laugh too hard at this) fans. So what if the only people that actually read my stuff happen to be related to me my blood or marriage? Anyway, on to the excuse. See, the title says it all. I am at war. No, it's not the Call Of Duty 4 type of war, but the real thing. I am currently station at FOB (forward operating base) Hammer in Iraq. I know, cool name isn't it? I hate to say though, that this is definitely one of the worst places for a avid gamer to be. Hell, I can't even get Internet here without going to an Internet cafe that the whole post stands in line for. Hopefully that will change soon. As far as gaming goes I'm hurting big time. No 360. No PS3. Not even a Wii. I do have my DS and PSP, but those little things can only get a hardcore gamer so far. Oh, the humanity of it all.

I'm not saying that buying a DS and PSP was a mistake. On the contrary, I'd be a lot worse off without them. I don't actually need an electronic device to keep me entertained, I do read frequently, but they do break the monotony of a place like this. Here's a little something you may not know, gaming is a very popular pastime for deployed military members. During my last deployment to the land of camels and dirt just about my entire team had a PS2 or a computer. We had set up a LAN between our CHUs (container housing units) and had some memorable hours of Counterstrike matches (no, that wasn't all I did during the deployment). I wasn't very good at those matches, after all I was an avid console gamer used to a pad and didn't even have a mouse to use, but we had a great time.

And that is the whole point of gaming. Some people pick up a controller and instantly forget the purpose of these games. Fun. Contrary to popular belief, gaming is not just about increasing your gamerscore or getting as many trophies as possible. And in a place like this, a little fun goes a long way.

I think that covers it for my long overdue update. I look forward to being able to get online soon with my Xbox and have some fun with other gamers. I may not be able to do it this month, but it will happen. 'Til next time.

Starting out on the new dashboard you have several choices that are called channels. It starts with the Spotlight channel and goes to the My Xbox channel, Game Marketplace channel, Video Marketplace channel, Friends channel, Inside Xbox channel, the Events channel, and finally, the Welcome channel (this channel can be set to hide if you don't want it). I can't stress enough how clean and uncluttered the new system is. Finding the channel I want is as easy as pushing the left stick up or down. When you hit the channel that you want, say the My Xbox channel, you will see additional tiles appear to the right of the main one. Again, using the left stick, you can move left or right to select which subchannel that you want. If you want to see your achievements for example (and who wouldn't?) select the My Xbox channel. From there you will see (if your profile is signed in) your avatar standing there in front of the second tile. Select that subchannel, then move to the right. From there you will see that each game you have played will have it's very own tile, and on these tiles, you will see all the acheivements for that game.

When I say every game I mean every game is shown. If you've played Spongebob just to pad your gamerscore, a tile will show up. Played a last gen Barbie game recently, yep, it'll be there too. On each tile you will see the title of the game, a couple of bars on the right side (signifying the gamerscore and the number of achievements unlocked from that title), date last played and all the achievements available for that game shown below. I love gaming, but I'm obviously not a gamerscore whore as my tiles show. I don't have any of the titles know for score padding and even have a pretty good amount of locked achievements from the games that I have played. Maybe I'll get to those in the future. The bottom line is that with this new system all your information for a specific title is available with just one glance. Instead of having to drill down into a couple of menu options, it's all in plain sight for everyone to see.

Now, the big question. How is the marketplace handled on the NXE? Is it still a pain to try and find that title that you want? Starting off, there are two ways to get to the Marketplace channel. The first is using the main channel options by scrolling up or down to get to the Game or Video Marketplace channels. The second way is to push the Y button while on the Spotlight channel to go directly to the Game Marketplace channel. From here you have the option of selecting All Games, Arcade, Game Add-ons, Community Games, Xbox Originals, Themes and Gamer Pictures, Game Demos, and Game Videos. All of the previous options have 3 main selection tiles asocciated with them. You can select from a New Arrivals, Most Popular, or Browse tiles. These options are pretty self explanatory and basic, no need to go into detail. Now, let me walk you through something that I found interesting. Say, you see that Xbox Originals has just added GTA: San Adreas. Hit the A button on that tile and it takes you to another section with 5 tiles in it. The first shows the price and purchase options, pretty much the same as the old dashboard did. The next title over is the featured downloads tile, not much interesting here. The next tile over is where the new stuff starts. Images and screenshots, about damn time. Now, you can finally see what you are getting before you buy it, granted, not such a big deal with the original titles, but very welcome with gamer pics and themes. The next tile shows some basic information and features that the game has. Finally, the last tile has a full description of the game. What I like about this tile that was fixed from the old dash is that you can scroll the description up and down instead of waiting for it to do it automatically. New features, I love it.

Here's something else new, Community Games. As the description on the NXE says "user-created indie games that are not reviewed by ratings boards." So, some fruit off of the XNA tree has arrived. These are independently developed games that are being sold for 200-400 Microsoft points. These games follow the same basic description format as all the other titles do on the Marketplace, to include a full description and screenshots. There is one difference though. Since these titles are not reviewed by the ESRB they do not have a rating attached to them, enter you and me. These titles are reviewed instead by the community. They are rated from a 0 to 3 scale (0 being none) on violence, sex and mature content. This way little Timmy's mom knows what he should and should not play, just as she would with traditional games. There are only 16 Community Games right now, but expect that number to grow in the next few months.

I think that covers all the basics, oh wait. I forgot about the new harddrive install option. How could I let that slip my mind. This is one feature that I have been really interested in. My main question is not about load times (I really couldn't care less about that) but whether or not the 360's loud disc drive will be silenced by this addition. Let's try it out, shall we? My choice of game to install first is Fallout 3. A decently sized game to start things out. After you insert the disc, go to the My Xbox channel and hit the Y button. This will bring you to a tile with a couple of options on it. One of these options is install to hard drive. After selecting that option the installation begins. Installing the game itself took about 10 minutes to do, not so bad, after all, it'll be worth it if I could actually hear the game while playing it. Now the verdict. The 360 is indeed quiet while playing the game after the install. I started up Fallout 3 to hear...nothing at all.

OK, now I'm completely sold on this NXE thing. There are some great additions to the old formula that make the 360 easier to use and better looking too. I haven't spent any real time with this yet, so I can't say that everything is perfect. I just haven't ran into any problems yet.

Imagine my surprise when I checked the inbox of my humble e-mail to find a message from Microsoft. Well, I get messages about hotmail all the time (damn unblockable spam), but this was different, this was about the Xbox 360. So, what could Microsoft be telling me that I didn't already know? Then I saw the subject line. "Xbox 360 NXE- You have been selected." Me? Selected for the NXE preview? I know Major Nelson said that several thousand would be able to get in early, but since that logic didn't work for me with the LBP beta, I didn't expect it to work this time either. Well, on to the preview.

Downloading the update and installing it only takes 5 or 6 minutes. This is one advantage that Microsoft has over Sony, faster downloads and updates. It took 3 or 4 times as long to update LBP (which I also got yesterday, but that is for another post) to version 1.03 than it took to completely change my Xbox dashboard. Sony, you really need to fix that. Anyway, after the download and install is complete I was then required to select a virtual me. Yes, avatars are mandatory now. Is that a bad thing? No, I actually had a bit of fun selecting my avatar from the 8 standard choices, then customizing it to my liking. The change features tab has 9 choices in customizing your virtual dude (or dudette). You have the option to adjust your hair, eyes, eyebrows, ears, nose, face (facial features such as moles and freckles and facial hair are selected here), chin, mouth, and skin color and body (height and weight are adjusted here). Plenty of options for everyone.

Is that all you can do to your avatar? Nope, you can also select what clothes you want him or her to wear. There are 8 options for adjusting your avatars appearance here. You can choose what top, headwear, makeup (eye shadow and lip color), bottoms, head accessories (glasses and earrings), dress up (a white morning suit and a tan formal suit are here), shoes, and body accessories (wristwear, rings, gloves). The last option is the ability to save and name that special outfit that you just made. From here you get to take your gamer picture. You can zoom in or out, turn your avatar to the left or right, move his or her head around, and take whatever picture that you like. You want to take a picture of the top of your head? Feel free. How about the back? That's OK, too. You can preview the picture and then save if you like it. If you are done messing around with the digital you, you can either start over (if you are break mirrors ugly, you may want to take this option) or save and exit. After saving your avatar he does a little fist pump and a little jig. Now, onto the meat of the update, the dashboard itself.

My first impression of the NXE? I like it. The old dashboard just didn't do it for me. It felt like a step backward on a machine trying to be a step ahead. I never had an original Xbox, but the blades felt like they would have been more appropriate on that machine, not a next gen console. This update changes that for me, it looks cleaner, is easier to navigate, and seems to be organized a lot better then it was. I know some people will disagree with me for saying this, but the NXE has a similar setup to the XMB. Turn the XMB 90 degrees clockwise, use phrases instead of icons on the up/down portion of the bar and use tiles with descriptions and picures on them instead of the option choices for the left/right bar and you have the NXE. Look, I will be honest here, I think the XMB succeeded where the blades failed because of simplicity. The XMB was uncluttered with too much unneeded information and advertisements that the blades were littered with. Having an NXE that takes a few cues from the XMB is not a bad thing, and I applaud Microsoft for realizing it.

Continued in part II

You know what I hate? I hate having money and seeing something I want, but am unable to buy it. I hate it even worse when other people can do what I can't. What am I getting at here? I'm talking about not being able to buy certain games and downloading certain demos from Live just because of my location. I am an American that is serving in Germany. I have a US Live profile, but I can't buy every game on Live.

I first noticed this annoying little situation back when I first got my 360 in June of this year. Having just got the system (and in a location with a very limited selection of games) I decided to get the best of what was available, which ended up being Mass Effect. I loved the game, and then decided that boning up on the Xbox history wouldn't be bad either. I really wanted to try the first Halo, but without many options to get a copy, I wanted to get if off of the Xbox Originals section in the Live Marketplace. Oh, the cruelty involved. I could not purchase the game because it was not available in my region. How could it not be my region? I have a US profile in for the Marketplace, so I should be able to get all the games that people in the US get, right? Wrong. I have to assume that Microsoft doesn't want my money.

If this was just limited to Originals titles, I might understand, but it's not. I can't even download demos of certain games. I tried to get the Crackdown demo, a game that came out in the first few months of the 360, and got that same infuriating message. And here's what gets me. People are paying $50 a month for this service, for completely unavoidable reasons that I'm not going to go into here, I do not. Yet, the free service of the PlayStation Network does allow me to download EVERYTHING with a US profile. Hell, if I was so inclined, I could also sign up for every region that is available and get ALL their content, too. I have yet to see a "you can see me, but you can't buy me" message on PSN.

Don't get me wrong, I do like Live, and if my situation was better I'd have a gold account right this minute. I just can't stand to be told that I can't spend my money on what I want. I tried to download the Duke Nukem demo yesterday. Guess what happened? Yep, you know it. "Nah, nah. Can't play me." This also extends to trying to add payment options for Microsoft points. I can't buy any of those damn things off of Live due to the fact that my address is an APO address. APO stands for Army Post Office. APO is not an option, I know, I tried to buy points last night and couldn't. It wouldn't be so bad if I could get points cards here, but there aren't any in our PX (Post Exchange, the locale department store, of sorts). The last time I saw one was 2 months ago. Well, no Braid for me.

Microsoft needs to make Live more accessible for people like me. Often, the military community is completely ignored. And it's very frustrating for an active gamer, like myself, to not be able to get the games that I want. I know, we aren't a huge population, and I'm not going to question anyones patriotism, but enough already. Let us spend our money and support our favorite games. PSN does it, why don't you?

It seems that every week I read a story on backwards compatibility and what it means for this and future generations of consoles. One of the latest articles I've read is from xboxoz360gamer.com . The article touches on the benefits and problems with making last gen games playable with this generation of hardware. Of the many reasons, price and technology are the biggest.

Price is the obvious one. First off, if a publisher isn't going to make any money off of an older game being emulated on new hardware what incentive do they have? Writing new software for an old program costs money, and there's no way anyone will spend money on a title that may not sell. Here's an example from the publisher's viewpoint. Of all last gen games on the market, say an Xbox title, are customers more or less likely to be able to buy a new game or a used one? The stores I frequent don't even sell new Xbox games anymore, so what recourse do I have? If I want an older title I have to buy a used copy from either a brick and mortar retailer or order it from somewhere online (Amazon marketplace is a favorite of mine). How much of that sale does the publisher get? Zero. So, why would they spend money making emulation software for a game sale that they probably won't get any money from, when instead, they could be selling you a current generation game for $60? I don't think I need to answer that one.

Hardware manufacturers see it a little differently. Sure, it still costs them money to make old games play on new hardware. And it's also true that they don't get any money from a used game sale, but there is still two ways profits can come in. Number one is having the option for games to be downloaded digitally. Emulation without a disc is a more profitable option for old games since all the software necessary to play the game is downloaded with the program itself, no need for a physical disc and separate software. The benefits for this method of delivery is that the cost of programming emulation software for an older game is offset by the fact that money will be collected and given to the companies that made the game instead of Joe Blow down the street. Also, there's no need to manufacture a physical disc and packaging, thereby saving substantially on distribution costs, but there's a catch. Only games that are projected to provide a profit will get this treatment. Here's the way I see digital downloads: This situation is a win for both sides. On the developer/console maker side, they get the profits that they need to stay in business without spending millions on developing, packaging and marketing a new game. On the gamer side, they get the last gen game that they might not have played otherwise that is guaranteed to work and at a reasonable price.

Now, number two. Having a console that is backwards compatible may possibly increase overall hardware sales. Don't underestimate the benefit of having the ability for core gamers to stick in their older favorites and play them. I know I wanted backwards compatibility when I bought a next gen console. That's why I decided to get the 80 gig PS3 instead of the 40 gig model. The 40 was cheaper, but I could play most of my library of PS1 and PS2 games on the 80. I would have been less likely to buy the 80 gig, the more expensive model, if that option didn't exist. As far as the PS4 goes, though, I don't expect support for PS1 games. It's even likely that PS2 games may not be supported (if any older generations are at all). I think that would be a mistake, as I thought dropping BC for the 40 gig was. But, that's just my opinion.

In this generation, I can see (if not agree with) why Sony didn't include support for older games in some of it's consoles. The PS2 is still selling strong and is still getting new games. With that kind of staying power and wide availability, if customers without BC really want to play a last gen game, they can pick up a new PS2 pretty cheaply. Microsoft is a different story, though. Support for the original Xbox has been abandoned and that makes the need for BC an important feature for the 360's survival. So, why is BC important for the 360? I'll use myself as an example. The 360 is my first Microsoft console. Having that be the case, since the 360 is backwards compatibility, I wanted to go back and get a few of the older games just to see what I missed. To date I have more older games then new. Now, how is this good for Microsoft? I'll tell you. Look at the install base on the old system versus the new. Knowing that current numbers for the 360 just short of it's third year are almost equal to the 5 year total of the original you have to agree that there is the potential for a huge audience out there that has not played any of the older games. Now combine that with the ability to put those old Xbox games on Live and what do you get? Instant, reliable, and possibly substantial, income.

For me, physical discs and backwards compatibility is where it's at. For the console makers, publishers, and developers, though, it's going to be digital downloads in the future. It's a cheaper, faster, and more reliable method of getting the games in the hands of gamers. Maybe I am a dinosaur. Maybe I'll come around in the future. Either way, the guys and gals that put out the games are going to tell me, whether I like it or not.

It may surprise you to learn that like 99.9995% of gamers, I was unable to attend E3 this year-or any year for that matter. I know what you are thinking; "How does an incredibly talented and superb blogger like GlossGreen not get an invite to the biggest gaming event of the year"? This is going to sound amazing, but, I'm not actually that important in the gaming industry. Not yet at least. But, no use crying over spilled milk (or no milk in this case).

E3 is definitely one of the most covered electronics oriented events in the world. Granted, it's not as grandiose as it used to be, but it still pulls in the crowds. Gone are the days of binge drinking and booth babes (well, maybe not the drinking part), the party atmosphere, and definitely a lot of the showmanship. I remember reading about my favorite writer's escapades in the latest issue of PSM or GamePro, days, if not weeks, after the actual events happened. Then something happened to change how I got my information. I discovered the internet. I have to be honest here, up until 2 years ago, I didn't even own a computer. My news access was limited to what I could find in print, but no more. Now with sites from all the major magazine publishers, plus independents like N4G, Kotaku, Hooked Gamers, and Ripten, I have all the news I need. Almost.

It's kinda funny sometimes. I happen to visit a site almost everyday, but I can still miss something. I did that today. My wife says I'm the most unobservant person she knows (next ot our daughter), and here, she is absolutely right. I regularly visit IGN for gaming new, plus I also post these blog posts there. What I didn't notice is one of the links right on the front page. On the left side, not too far down from the top, was a link to their Live Wire Show. I had no idea what that was, thankfully, now I know.


Live Wire is where IGN is broadcasting LIVE all the press conferences from E3. I know a few other sites are doing that, too, but Live Wire looks absolutely amazing. I just watched the first few minutes of Microsoft's press conference and I have to say that seeing all that live impressed the hell out of me, and of course, my inner fanboy. Instead of waiting for the written press coverage, or days for a video, I can see the whole thing live. I get to see what was-previously-only available for those people that could attend the show. We get to see the first looks, the hands-on demos, the secrets from out of left field that no one even thought about. All from the comfort of my couch.

Does this take the sting away from not being able to attend in person? I does a little-but only a little. One of these days, I will make it to the promised land. Either that or maybe I'll hit PAX one of these days instead. Until that time, back to Live Wire.

As a serious gamer, when I'm not playing I like to read about games. I like knowing what's new, what's coming soon, and what's good or not. Like many of you I have my favorite sites to visit. My personal favs are Kotaku, Joystiq, Game Politics, and N4G. I've been active on N4G (with a couple months away, long story) for about 6 months. I like the fact that the registered users on that site collect and submit original articles from just about everywhere in the internet. Submitted articles are, of course, linked back to the original site, but that's not what I'm writing about today. I also happen to like the N4G forums. The N4G forums are a place that I go to interact with some great people that really love gaming. I never know what I'm going to see there, and that's the fun of going. Unfortunately, there are some people there that try to spoil it for all of us.

One of the problems with a social news site like N4G is that all people are different. One gamer may want to read more stories on the PS3, another the 360 only. To me, the console itself doesn't matter, just the games on it. That's why I don't understand some of these people. Luckily, there are some very active mods and admin on the site today. This wasn't always the case, but since I've decided to be active in the site again, I've noticed a change. Take a look at this thread and see the mods in action. And here's the same guy again. Snoop swoops in to save the day. Some people just never learn, and that's the problem with a lot of forums, the people themselves.

Quite a few people just love to cause as much trouble as they can online. Why do they do it? Because they think it's fun. I don't know why, I never thought giving people a hard time was ever fun. Then there are the ones that try to be as offensive as possible. There was one such person on N4G today. Take a look at this guy's profile. This person signed up to N4G just to cause problems, how do I know? There is absolutely no personal information on his profile. There's no gender or location. There are no interests or occupation listed. There's no bio or even gamer tags and everyone lists at least one of those. The only thing on there is a link to an e-mail address which, undoubtedly, is not a permanent account for him. I know you can't see his comments now and due their offensive nature I won't repeat them here.

Anonymity can be a great thing for some things, but when people like this populate sites, we all ultimately suffer. And that is why seeing the mods of N4G wield the almighty banhammer is such a good thing. Banned users can always try to create new accounts to cause some more animosity, but with the diligence of moderators we all can have a place to write, converse, and share who we are.

And to continue:

Enter the exclusivity deal. We've all seen how it works. Game A is coming out for Console A as an exclusive, and that's usually all we know. What we don't see is the fat roll of cash that the makers of Console A have given the game publisher to not release Game A on Console B. The reason for the payment to the publisher is to effectively pick up the difference between the sales of Game A to both consoles versus just one. In my previous example an exclusive could have cost the developer a lot of money, money needed to recoup development costs. But, if Console A's maker decides to pay for the right to be exclusive, then it's all good to the publisher. Console A gets its exclusive, and the publisher gets to make back its investment in the game. There is another option for the console makers, too.

A timed exclusive is really similar to a full exclusive, with a couple of exceptions. First, the timed exclusive is just that - timed. After a certain waiting period the title will become available to a rival console. Having an exclusive high quality AAA title (what we know as system sellers), even for a limited time, can conceivably boost console sales. A game like Halo has the potential to greatly increase profits for a console manufacturer, and thus, having the title exclusive to you will help to persuade little Timmy to buy your machine, and not the other guy's. What the consumer doesn't know usually is when a title is an exclusive or just a timed exclusive (recently Lost Planet and BioShock coming soon). The only way we, the consumer, finds out is when the game is announced (considerably later) and scheduled for release. Secondly, the cost of buying a timed exclusive is much less prohibitive then buying the title outright. This leaves more money for the console makers to develop their own first party games and promote their respective systems.

With Microsoft just recently (after the Halo 3 launch) in the black and Sony at over one billion in deficit, the exclusive tactic just doesn't seem to make a lot of sense. Spending a ton of money just so the other guy can't get it may sell a few systems, but it isn't a good strategy in the long run. What the console makers have to realize (Nintendo is definitely in the forefront here) is that first party games are cheaper then locking up a third party game, and helps consumers to identify with your products. Mario will forever be associated with Nintendo, and more recently, Master Chief will always be with Xbox. And Sony..Well, Sony needs to work on it still, but you get my meaning. The bottom line is that exclusives are expensive (an estimated $50 million for exclusive Xbox GTA DLC proves the point) and may not work to sell consoles, no matter how good they are.

In this day and age of multiple competing consoles and cross platform gaming I got to thinking - how much longer are companies going to make games exclusive? With sky rocketing development and marketing costs, longer development times, and a narrowing gap in install bases, it just doesn't seem to make much sense. At least to me it doesn't.

Hollywood has definitely influenced this generation of gaming systems. With cinematic and well produced games out there like Uncharted: Drakes Fortune and Mass Effect there comes a price. Actually, the price is what comes with the quality. It takes longer (much, much longer) and requires more resources to make high quality games these days. You need quality people (art, programming, producers, directors), quality equipment, and lots of time. Unfortunately, all three cost money in one way or another. People don't work for peanuts, no matter how much they believe in their game. Development tools also cost money, both the hardware systems and middleware tools and engines. Then there's time itself, just ask 3D Realms how much money they've spent over the past 10 years with Duke Nukem Forever.

Think of the time factor this way: Every day of development is one day later that the product can be on the store shelves, and if the game isn't on the shelf, then there are no profits being made. Games do not make anybody money while they are being developed, and every publisher knows this. Because of the need to push out products, publishers often set deadlines with penalties for not achieving them, go over budget or time and the developers could lose some bonus money. Plus, miss that key holiday season like Christmas and the game may not make any money at all.

Now, that's the basics on how development costs money. So how do exclusives fit into this? An exclusive on one console over another means less potential sales for the title. For example: Console A may have an install base of 40 million while Console B may only have 15 million. Seeing this a game publisher may decide to only sell the game to Console A owners, setting up a console exclusive. Instantly, the publisher loses on the potential to sell the game to an additional 15 million gamers. Even if only 5% of 15 million consumers would buy the game, that's still 750,000 willing to part with their hard earned money. Just to put it in perspective, $60 times 750,000 equals $45,000,000. There would have to be a real good incentive for a publisher or developer to give up on that kind of potential...And I'll have to cover that in tomorrow's post.

Well, I finally did it. I finally plunked some of my hard earned (and government returned) cash on a shiny new Xbox 360. Shiny is just a figure of speech since I bought the flat black Elite model, but you get the point. All I can say is thank you U.S. for having tax returns and stimulus money.

Sorry, back to the Xbox story. I'd been thinking about picking up a 360 for quite a while, but I initially held out due to the whole nasty RRoD business. Two conditions finally seemed right for me to risk buying one of Microsoft's machines. The first was the shear lack of any news on the RRoD subject these last few months. I haven't seen one article recently in regards to the whole general system failure fault. I know Microsoft has been working to fix the faults, and it seems like they have made some progress. Even so if it hadn't been for the increase of the warranty for 3 years, I don't think I'd ever have purchased one. That was the second positive change. Not quite the full disclosure on why the consoles were failing, but better then nothing. After that, I just had to get one. Why? As any true game would tell you, "it's the games stupid".

See, here's the thing. I don't care about the consoles themselves, just the games. I didn't buy a PS3 because it was a Sony machine. I bought it due to the fact that it had some great games currently released for it and more coming soon. The whole Blu-ray thing didn't hurt either. I bought my PSP instead of a DS because of all the potential that that little machine was capable of. Did Sony influence my decision in that regard? No, it didn't. And that's why I had no problem with picking up a 360 two days ago.

For my Microsoft purchase I decided to go big (see, I actually paid attention to the box) and pick up an Elite. I thought the large hard drive and the black color was a good match for my shiny (actually shiny) PS3 that I already had at home, plus the whole white thing is too shabby chic for me. I don't care what Games Radar has to say, black is better. The harder choice was deciding on the one game that I had enough money to buy. Picking up the Elite plus one game is a heck of a lot of money for my meager budget (the government wasn't that generous). The choice definitely wasn't easy, but I finally narrowed it down to two. The finalists were Halo 3 and Mass Effect. I decided to go with Mass Effect. Like I said, one game, and since I haven't played the first 2 Halo games, picking up the third really didn't make much sense. The Halo series is most definitely still on my list to buy in the future. Maybe the government will be generous and send some more money my way. I know, wishfully thinking. I just tend to be optimistic.

So finally, I have my game, I have my console and since I'm on vacation, I have the time to play. Speaking of which, Mass Effect - and it's achievements - are calling my name.